<!DOCTYPE html>
<html>
<head>
<meta charset="UTF-8">
<title>Make Damn Sure by myracingthoughts</title>
<style type="text/css">

body { background-color: #ffffff; }
.CI {
text-align:center;
margin-top:0px;
margin-bottom:0px;
padding:0px;
}
.center   {text-align: center;}
.cover    {text-align: center;}
.full     {width: 100%; }
.quarter  {width: 25%; }
.smcap    {font-variant: small-caps;}
.u        {text-decoration: underline;}
.bold     {font-weight: bold;}
</style>
</head>
<body>
<h1><a href="https://archiveofourown.org/works/25690951">Make Damn Sure</a> by <a class='authorlink' href='https://archiveofourown.org/users/myracingthoughts/pseuds/myracingthoughts'>myracingthoughts</a></h1>

<table class="full">

<tr><td><b>Series:</b></td><td>Darcy Lewis Bingo 2020 [4]</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Category:</b></td><td>Captain America (Movies), Marvel Cinematic Universe, The Avengers (Marvel Movies), Thor (Movies)</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Genre:</b></td><td>Confinement, F/M, Interrogation, Kidnapping, SHIELD Agent Darcy Lewis</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Language:</b></td><td>English</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Status:</b></td><td>Completed</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Published:</b></td><td>2020-08-03</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Updated:</b></td><td>2020-08-03</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Packaged:</b></td><td>2021-05-05 07:07:24</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Rating:</b></td><td>Mature</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Warnings:</b></td><td>No Archive Warnings Apply</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Chapters:</b></td><td>1</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Words:</b></td><td>2,185</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Publisher:</b></td><td>archiveofourown.org</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Story URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/works/25690951</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Author URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/users/myracingthoughts/pseuds/myracingthoughts</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Summary:</b></td><td><div class="userstuff">
              <p>Darcy Lewis gets kidnapped and refuses to be a part of their seriously deluded (and overused) plot. </p><p>You know, standard bad guy stuff.</p>
            </div></td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Relationships:</b></td><td>James "Bucky" Barnes/Darcy Lewis</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Series:</b></td><td>Darcy Lewis Bingo 2020 [4]</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Series URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/series/1927495</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Comments:</b></td><td>30</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Kudos:</b></td><td>389</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Collections:</b></td><td>Darcy Lewis Bingo</td></tr>

</table>

<a name="section0001"><h2>Make Damn Sure</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Author's Note:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
      <p>This fic was written for Darcy Lewis Bingo and checks off box D2: SHIELD Agent Darcy.</p>
    </blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>“Darcy Lewis.”</p><p>It took a few seconds for the words to register, slightly warbled as Darcy struggled to open her eyes. </p><p>She felt like she was underwater, fighting against the current of exhaustion that begged her to shut her eyes again. Too drowsy to question the person saying her name aloud like he was doing attendance. Maybe she was still dreaming, caught between sleep and reality.</p><p>Darcy stopped fighting her eyelids, giving in to the tiredness tugging at her.</p><p> “No siblings. No parents. No emergency contacts. Curious.”</p><p>That caught her attention, and suddenly sleep didn’t sound like such a good idea.</p><p>Lolling her head to the side, she wondered if this was what a concussion felt like. She fought to get a hold of herself, sharp pain shooting to her temples at every micro movement. At least she could <i>feel</i>. That was a good sign, she thought, remembering something Natasha had told her once in passing.</p><p>“You don’t seem to have much of a SHIELD file, hm?”</p><p>The echoes of pacing and the sound of flipping pages gave away the cell’s only other occupant. White male, glasses, lab coat with a folder in his hands. Who still used paper file folders anyway? No visible branding — if only all the bad guys made it that easy. </p><p>Dude was about as unmemorable as they get, which meant he was perfect minion fodder.  </p><p>Was he AIM? Hydra? Some other nameless terrorist sect birthed from either of those supposedly shuttered organizations? It was anyone’s guess. They were all pretty generic; world domination, experimentation, a general lack of morals and ethics. </p><p>You know, standard bad guy stuff.</p><p>The weight of her hanging head tugged on the vertebrae at the base of her skull, and a hiss escaped Darcy’s lips before she could stop it, giving her away.</p><p>“Finally waking up, are we?”</p><p>The fact that she was alone in a room with some creep was starting to settle in as reality. This wasn’t some nightmare she was going to wake up from, which was a hard pill to swallow. </p><p>She wasn’t sure if it was shock or if the room was actually that cold, but either way, everything from her fingers to her jaw rattled, every reflexive jerk highlighting fresh bruises and scrapes. And she started to realize just how hard breath was to come by in her hunched over position.</p><p>Whoever got her to wherever she was really wasn’t worried about banging up the merchandise.</p><p>“Where am I?” she rasped through her teeth chatters.</p><p><i>Breathe in and remember what the spy folk taught you, Lewis.</i> Her internal dialogue might have sounded a lot like a very grumpy Clint Barton — pre-caffeine and before noon, for some reason — but it had a point. </p><p>It wasn’t a plan, but it was a starting point. There were steps, and they were a little foggy with the (probable) head trauma. First, Darcy started to slowly take stock of herself, wiggling fingers and toes to make sure they were still attached. Someone had tied their hands behind her back, looping the itchy rope through the bars of the metal chair’s back.</p><p>Pulling her wrists away from each other, she tested it for give, but no dice.</p><p>“Ah, ah, Miss Lewis. We don’t get to skip straight to the end. There’s so much you have left to tell me.” </p><p>The fatherly tsk seemed to echo in the room as Darcy choked a sob, her heavy breathing drowning out the auxiliary noise so she could focus.</p><p>
  <i> You’ve got to stay focussed here, Lewis. What’s the next step?</i>
</p><p>What could she see? Concrete walls, probably a cell if the bars on the small, basement-style window were any indication. It was dark out — what day was it? </p><p>The last thing she could remember was being at the office. That had definitely been on a Thursday because she had passed Luther the security guard in the lobby on her way in. She could vividly picture pouring Jane a still-steaming mug of coffee (three sugars and two creams) before… </p><p>No, she had definitely set it down on one of the many paper-covered desks in her lab. Even put a hot pink sticky note on it to remind her to call Bruce with the results.</p><p>Did she manage to get home that day? The memory felt fuzzy around the edges, but she could vaguely recall being caught off guard, pulled from behind and hauled into a vehicle. Where had they even grabbed her? If it was anywhere near Avengers Tower, she was going to have a long, unpleasant conversation with Tony when she got back.</p><p>Until then, she’d have to keep herself alive.</p><p>
  <i>What are people uncomfortable with?</i>
</p><p>“Please, I don’t kn-know anything important. I’m just a lab assistant. Barely an assistant, even. A glorified intern. If you let me go, I-I won’t say anything!” </p><p>Tucking her chin into her chest, Darcy let the tear track down her cheek and drip onto the unfinished floor below, industrial drainage grates just feet from her own. OK, that totally wasn’t foreboding or anything. Neither was the dark brown ring around the metal plate that wasn’t quite rust-coloured.</p><p>She could hear a low chuckle from the corner of the room, snapping her out of her pained expression and making her second guess her tactic.</p><p>OK, so Clint’s helpless and clueless ploy wasn’t working on this guy. It had been a longshot anyway. What was next on the list? It was on the tip of her tongue, just out of her reach.</p><p>“You and I both know that’s quite true, Miss Lewis. After all, you do love to keep the Captain company.”</p><p>
  <i>Listen, Lewis. Bad guys are like frat boys; they don’t take a hint, and they’ll tell you their whole goddamn plan if you play into their ego long enough. Or piss them off.</i>
</p><p>Right, she was supposed to keep the asshole talking. Talking was good. Talking was not hitting or slicing or… <i>other</i> things. </p><p>But this guy was getting old fast. Frankly, his monologue had been so dull she was pretty sure he wasn’t that one in charge here. He might as well have been faceless; she didn’t care who he was so much as why it was him. He hadn’t given away anything useful besides a fascination with Steve Rogers —which, to be honest, lumped him in with the majority of the assholes after the Avengers— <i>and</i> he was somehow dumb enough to believe she was somehow romantically involved with him.</p><p>This guy was a class-A moron and probably wasn’t worth his weight in sawdust.</p><p>Dr. Douchebag’s voice was grating on her last nerve, and while her ribs and head throbbed with every movement, his annoying voice was a figurative stab to the chest with a very rusted blade.</p><p> And, since scared little ol’ Darcy Lewis wasn’t doing the trick, she didn’t have a whole lot to lose.</p><p>“I’m literally no one. You guys must have really screwed up if I was the only one you managed to get,” she shot with a self-assured grin. “I know nothing.”</p><p>Darcy took a few last looks around the room, making sure she hadn’t missed anything. Her jacket was gone, boots sitting in the corner of the room behind her interrogator. She spotted her taser on the desk behind him, way beyond her reach.</p><p>“Well, then it’s very fortunate we haven’t brought you here for your knowledge, Miss Lewis. Tell me, do you think he’ll come to save you today? The Captain?”</p><p>Ugh, the classic damsel in distress scenario. She wanted no part of this overused plot.</p><p>And as her fingers fumbled from disuse behind her, they landed on a familiar silver strand still around her wrist. She had to hide a smile. They’d probably written it off as some cheap craft-store-level trinket. It certainly didn’t <i>look</i> expensive enough to be worth more than their whole mom’s basement operation —that had been intentional— but she was pretty sure these idiots wouldn’t know Tiffany from Target.</p><p>A plan started to form.</p><p>“Or maybe he will come just in time to see your blood all over this floor?”</p><p>Darcy’s ears perked at the sound of metal on metal, breath hitching slightly as she realized she hadn’t factored a weapon into this particular scenario. Especially not a blade. But she probably should have expected it, with the deserted clinical aesthetic going on in this dingey cellar.</p><p>He paced towards her, knife glinting in the dim light. Three steps and she could feel his breath on the back of her neck, his body pressed against the back of her chair. Her skin prickled at the sensation, and her jaw clenched in anticipation of his next move. </p><p>Darcy swallowed thickly as his arm hooked around her neck, blade in hand. The cold metal ghosted over her skin, and she tried her hardest to squirm out of his grip. The flat traced the outline of her face. Eyes screwed her eyes shut and neck straining from trying to avoid his grasp, this looked bad. </p><p>Really bad.</p><p>So bad she didn’t even have a Clint-ism to help her out of this one.</p><p>Maybe she should have just tried the helpless play a little longer. Darcy may have overestimated this, might have bitten off more than she could chew, but she couldn’t back down now, not when she was so close. With a steadying breath, she took what might have been her only chance.</p><p>“I think you really are an idiot if you think Steve Rogers is going to storm through that door and save me,” she seethed.</p><p>She whimpered at his sudden hold on her face, strong enough to leave bruises later, she’d bet.</p><p>“And why is that?” </p><p>The knife trailed down to her throat and dug a little deeper into the skin, and she tried desperately to pull away from him.</p><p>A tiny hitch of her breath.</p><p>A dash of real fear.</p><p>A bit of acting.</p><p>“Because…”</p><p>Unclasping the bracelet on her wrist, she pulled the catch and clipped it to his pant leg. The effect was instantaneous, a jolt of electricity shot through him, and his body jerked, taking a shallow slice out of her with motion.</p><p>“I don’t need anyone to save me,” she spat out, mostly for effect.</p><p>The knife clattered to the floor, and she inched her chair over, leaning back on the hind legs to reach for it. Darcy made quick work of the cheap rope, rubbing the raw skin around her wrists with her hands before checking the cut on her neck.</p><p>She was fine, and he’d be out for a little while.</p><p>Pretty and practical, she thought, graciously removing the now-spent bracelet from where it clipped itself to the fabric and slipping it into her pocket. She could already hear the commotion from outside of the cell. She hugged the wall, staying out of sight from anyone who might peer into the hole in the door and listened carefully.</p><p>“East wing clear, making my way over to detention.”</p><p>Showtime.</p><p>Feeling comforted by the lack of gunshots and the familiar voice, Darcy Lewis looked up from inspecting her nails just as the door cracked open —the kidnappers totally ruined her recent manicure— and found a perplexed Sam Wilson looking at her. His eyes snapped between the unconscious body on the floor and back to her aloof expression.</p><p>Darcy shrugged, “Maybe next time they’ll make damn sure the girl they grab isn’t a trained SHIELD agent. Not bad for my first month on the job, huh?”</p><p>Having rendered Sam sufficiently speechless, she watched him radio in that she was safe before he handed her a small earbud.</p><p>“Is Steve on this?” she asked, and he nodded. She cleared her throat and pressed the button, “I thought you might like to know, Mr. Rogers, that Dr. Douchebag here was dead set on you being my beau. Where would he get that seriously twisted idea?”</p><p>“Might have kept you alive, Lewis,” Steve replied over the nattering chuckles on the line.</p><p>“Wait, you did <i>what</i>, punk?”</p><p>Darcy giggled, “Don’t worry, Buck. I’m still your girl.”</p><p>“Not for long,” Natasha crackled over the line. “Not after that performance.”</p><p>A slight growl travelled over comms, and she was pretty sure she knew exactly what face Bucky was making right now, “Steven Grant Rogers, tell me right now that you didn’t use my girlfriend as bait for this operation?”</p><p>“Listen, Buck—“</p><p>“Boys, this is <i>so</i> not the time—“ </p><p>Darcy tried to interject in the fray over the airwaves but was talked over by the gruff dulcet tones of one Clint Barton, who apparently had an override button somewhere on the jet, “Guys, can you assert your dominance at home? This bird’s ready to go.”</p><p>Natasha’s snicker crackled over the line as Darcy tried to settle her furrowed brows. Sam, too was having a hard time getting his expression under control, tugging at his collar slightly with a guilty grin. </p><p>“Heading back. We’ll uh, debrief on the jet,” Steve announced, not sounding quite as confident as before.</p><p>“Oh, don’t worry, Stevie. We’ll have words.”</p>
  </div><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_foot_notes"><b>Author's Note:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>Hello Wintershock friends! I'm back again with another fun one. Hope you enjoyed it. </p><p>I have a couple (few?) more Wintershock fics planned for this bingo card, so keep your eyes out for them.</p><p>All comments, kudos and bookmarks are loved and cherished.<br/>You can also find me on <a href="https://pasmonblog.tumblr.com/">tumblr</a>, where I post comic book content, work updates, and behind-the-scenes commentary.</p><p>Song title credit: MakeDamnSure by: Taking Back Sunday</p></blockquote></div></div>
</body>
</html>